 Hello and welcome to this event from the British Library, part of our nature season, The Natural Word. I'm Brett Walsh of the Cultural Events Department. As you can see, I'm not in the library today. I'm talking to you from my garden in South London, but the library is open for readers now and our exhibitions will be opening very soon. So if you'd like to book your place, please do visit our website. It's my pleasure to welcome you to tonight's event, a conversation between Anita Seti and Caroline Sanderson. Anita's going to be talking about her new book, I Belong Here, which is out today. So if you'd like to order a copy, please do so using the button just above the video. Now before I hand over to Caroline, I've just got a few points of housekeeping. We will be taking a public Q&A towards the end of the event, so if you've got a question for Anita, please do submit it using the Q&A form just below the video. In the menu above, you'll find a bookshop link. You'll also find a button to give us your feedback. Your feedback is really important, so we hope you'll take the time to fill that out. And we'll also, there's also a button to donate to the library. The library is a charity, so your donations are really appreciated. So Caroline Sanderson is a writer and journalist who regularly interviews writers on page, stage and screen. She is Associate Editor of the Bookseller, is Artistic Director of the Stroud Book Festival, and Associate Fellow of the Royal Literary Fund. As well as all this, she's also the author of five non-fiction books of her own. So without further ado, I'm going to hand over to Caroline and Anita. Thank you very much. Well, good evening everyone and a very warm welcome from me too. To be chairing this event tonight is a huge pleasure and honour for me. Firstly, because I am myself a loyal out-of-town member of the British Library and I can't wait to get myself back into the building in person. But secondly, because I have long been an admirer of the journalism and all the interviews of our guests tonight, Anita Sethi, and now I get to interview her. And then there's her book, I Belong Here, a Journey Along the Backbone of Britain. I've been previewing new non-fiction for the Bookseller magazine every month for more than 20 years and hopefully by now I mostly know when I'm in the presence of a very special book such as this. After reading Anita's book, I wrote I Belong Here is a shining example of how books at their best can be an act of resistance and a communal force for good. And I truly believe that that's what this book is. Anita, welcome to you. It's so fabulous to be doing this launch event with you and thanks so much for asking me to do it. It's publication day, congratulations. How does it feel? Very exciting. It's really, really exciting to actually see it out in the world and thank you so much for doing this. Thank you so much to the British Library for hosting it and thank you to everyone watching at home. It's really exciting to actually have the book launched and also very lucky that bookshops are actually open. It was amazing because I actually saw it on a bookshop shelf for the first time and it felt real for the first time. So hurrah, hurrah. Now you've had some really cracking reviews already. The Guardian said it was a book of rare power and the Sunday Times said this book is a thing of beauty and of course Robert McFarlane said it was a brilliant, brave and important book. Now it, as I said, it's reinforced my belief in books as a force for good but of course its writing was sparked by something really quite horrific, a race hate crime of which you were a victim while traveling on a train through the northern England. Now I'm not going to go into the details of what happened now because people can read about it in your book and I'd rather talk about the book but suffice it to say that you courageously reported the crime and the man responsible was arrested and later convicted. So can we start by you telling us how this horrendous incident and I might say it was by not the first time in your life that you've faced racism. How did this incident lead to you deciding to walk the Penangway? Thank you, yeah well as you say it's not the first time that it's happened but I was on a Trans-Pennine train going from Liverpool to Newcastle one day and I was going to the northern launch of a new anthology that I'm in called Common People and the man started racially abusing me on the train. I won't repeat what he said in case there were young people watching and but he told me to go back to where I'm from and I'm from the north. I mean the train that I was on actually passed through Manchester on the way and so I decided to do what the man told me. I went back to where I'm from so one day I was looking at a map of the Pennines and it happened to be a Trans-Pennine train and there rose miniature mappings of mountains and hills and the Pennine way snaked through my dreams all summer tempting me to walk upon it and make a journey of reclamation and that's exactly what I did so the title of the book is I belong here a journey along the backbone of Britain and the title's kind of has three-form meaning because it's obviously what I'm saying in response to the man who told me I didn't belong here. It's also something nature itself is saying because nature was extremely healing to me I found a lot of solace in it throughout my journey walking through the natural landscapes of the north and the Great Pennine Range and I would listen to the birds singing and wonder what they might be singing and I felt that they might be saying I belong here and I belong here is also something the book itself is saying because for far too long you know the stories of marginalized groups have been treated as if they don't belong in books so I did want to put this story down in book form which is why it's particularly nice as well to be doing the launch event with the British Library which is a absolute haven of books and since childhood I have sought refuge in libraries and surrounded by books so to launch my own with the British Library where I spent so much time in the reading rooms is great. Yeah I think you've just given us a hint there of how many layers are on this book which is something I want to talk about in a minute but why don't we have get a flavour of your beautiful writing I think you're I think you're going to read us something. Yes I've got a little bit to read. I won't read too much because Caroline has loads of wonderful questions as an expert interviewer but so the book is structured around the body it has parts called mouth which is about speaking up skin which is obviously drawing on my experience of racism but then I progressively wanted to get deeper beneath the skin and show what runs skin deep so there's also a section called backbone and the word backbone was resonant and powerful to me as I walk because it refers to what's known as a backbone of Britain the Great Penine Range of mountains made from limestone and something called Winsill and obviously it then took took on other meanings about what does it mean to have backbone and then the next section is life blood something that I wanted to get beneath the skin and show nearly oxygen and life blood that flows through all of us and then it closes with the feet but the prologue is called a place called hope and I will read a little bit from that. I watched the wings as they sawed through the sky so sure of itself so confident was a Curlie as it caressed the cloud so in its element where do I belong such a perennial question of existence and I remember the flight of that Curlie I saw in the Pennines when I considered the quest for a sense of belonging the bird belongs in its fine feathers and in its nest and in the air flying through the sky with such ease and grace the fish belongs in its spectacular scales and in its watery habitat the bull belongs in soil in its state of becoming growing towards the light how could I feel a sense of belonging in my own body in my own self in the world what does it mean to belong what does it mean to feel like you don't belong how can nature help us to find a greater sense of belonging and how can we ensure people care enough to realise that nature and wildlife belong as much to the world as humans do all my life I felt like I didn't belong and I grew used to that sense of belonging being an outsider has shaped my life in many ways and made me become a writer but there comes a time when it's necessary to say I belong here it might come when someone is trying to push you from a place to eradicate you it might come when your basic rights are being denied it might come when you are struggling to breathe clean air when you are struggling to breathe at all it's exhausting having to prove and explain why we belong yet so often I have I had to do so on account of multiple macro and microaggressions ultimately I hope for a world in which every creature great and small is accepted and I don't have to say it at all I was on a journey through northern England in early summer 2019 and I became the victim of a hate crime when attack when a man attacked my right to belong here with words that hurt the very heart of me the north is my home having been born and bred in Manchester the Transpennine express train even passed through the city on its route from Liverpool to Newcastle the hate crime was a vicious attack on my right to exist in a place on account of my race I was told to get back on the banana boat and go back to where you're from yet this country is where I belong hate crime is on the rise in our hostile environment after the attack some advised me to stop traveling alone due to the dangers and I experienced panic attacks and anxiety at the thought of traveling by myself but I was intent on not letting a hate crime stop me moving about freely and without fear in a country where I belong I was eager to continue traveling alone as a woman asserting my right to exist one day I was looking at a map of the north and there along the route of my train journey falls the Pennines the backbone of England with its nature reserves national parks and areas about standing natural beauty an area of countryside designated for conservation due to its significant landscape value my heart quickened as I looked at the miniature mappings of its mountains and rivers the Trans-Pennine express journey had run a route tantalizingly close to such Pennine areas but it would take walking and local railways to fully explore it I longed to journey through the natural landscapes of the north transforming what began as an ugly experience of hate and exclusion into one offering hope and finding beauty after brutality go back to where you're from this is where I'm from I'm from the north the glorious north our emotional connection with certain places runs deep and forceful as a river and during and after the hate crime I felt how profound my connection was with the north although a racist had viciously told me to leave I felt a magnetic pull drawing me back not to get further from it but even deeper into it my journey is one of reclamation a way of saying to adapt the Woody Guthrie song title this land is my land too and I belong in the UK is a brand woman just as much as a white man does journeying through the so-called backbone of England also feels symbolic a way of showing backbone myself and that I will not let having been victim of a race hate crime could tail my movements through the world despite the trauma and panic attacks that followed I began to devour more and more maps of the Pennines and plot out a route reading up about the Pennine Way Britain's oldest long-distance footpath which runs for 431 kilometers through the backbone of Britain as my claustrophobia grew I began to long for wide open spaces to breathe freely in the great outdoors I hungered for greenness I zoomed in on a map of the Peak District where the Pennine Way begins and where the north begins its border how glorious to glimpse a place named Hope it's there I wanted to start my journey walking through Hope Valley the night before the hate crime I had happened to stay in a place called Hope Street Hotel on Hope Street in Liverpool my actual experiences turned out to be profoundly allegorical since then I tried to channel Hope throughout drawing on Hope at my lowest at I felt strongly that journeying again through the north had something to offer me and I wanted to follow that gut instinct places where traumatic events occur take on even greater significance they become a part of us often drawing us back to the place to understand something about it to transform it into a place of empowerment and that's how I felt about the Trans-Pennine Express journey and my journey of reclamation through the Pennines one day in mid-summer I finally make a move I get the Hope Valley line from Manchester reopened after saw the dorm closure I see flashes of purple rosebay willow herb through the window I step off the train into Edale the gateway to the Pennines and feel the noise of the city fall away as the train engines fade silence envelops me but for the birdsong I had no little about this history when I boarded the Hope Valley line train to Edale what a symbolic place it is to walk through as I assert my right to roam through the world for it's here near the Kinder Scout moorland plateau that the Manchester Ramblers campaigned for access to private to to greater access to the countryside their walk was celebrated in the folk song The Manchester Rambler by poet and folk singer Ewan McColl who marched during the protest and knew that walking could be a radical and political act and need to change that walking could be a way of saying I belong here thank you very much I'm back to more reading later but I think it'll be good to have some questions yes yes I I mean it just reminds me so much of the first time that I I read the book and how powerful that that prologue is and this extraordinary as you say that this profoundly allegorical journey that you set out on because not only is this you know what we think of as classic work of nature writing and travel writing so it charts a journey and you describe the landscape and you describe the nature around you um but but it's you know it's this allegorical thing that is so powerful about it so you set out on this walk along the Penang Way through a sedimentary limestone landscape built up of many stratoes see I looked up my geology and and when I was reading it that's how I came to think of your book that a book of layers and preoccupations and it feels as if you know your your inner journey follows your outer journey did is is that was that your experience of it at the time yeah thank you Caroline I could listen to you talk about the book all day which is why I kind of I stumbled over my reading and stopped it no one else wants to listen to me talking about the book Caroline talk about the book I have to say you know like I'm a first time this is my first book and one of the magical things has been having it meet the readers like people have been asking me was it cathartic to write the book and make the journey you know one of the most amazing things is actually having it meet readers like yourself and having Caroline was one of my first readers and did an amazing piece interviewing the book seller and it was you know the first published piece that came out about the book and you know I was blown away by your reading of it and I loved how you describe these sedimentary you know picked up on that in the book so thank you first of all for such a perceptive reading but absolutely and the allegorical quality of the journey was something that the landscape gave to me you know it was just and that was one of the magical things about the northern the natural landscapes for the north and about nature it does have this incredibly metaphorical and symbolic quality so I started off in hope and hope was you know it's the name of a place but it's also something that I tried to channel throughout and it was actually literally seeing a place named hope when I was quite immobilized with anxiety after the racist attack. Anxiety is a very immobilizing thing it leads to inertia where I was traveling and what has become what some describe as a travel book it's also a blend of nature writing and so on it's the opposite of that it's the opposite of being a nerd and it was it was the place name called hope that really made me get up and make the journey if I had not zoomed in on the map that you know auspicious evening and seen a place called hope I'm not sure I would have actually made that journey so hope I did literally channel hope throughout that was one layer of allegory and then the other as you so picked up on in your lovely piece that you wrote about the book there was a place name called settle and that's a place in the Yorkshire Dales and I had never even heard of settle before you know I grew up in Manchester and didn't really go on trips to the lovely Yorkshire Dales and so when I arrived at this place called settle it was just triggered off so many thoughts about I mean this is a journey for me it's an emotional and personal journey as well as a journey along the back bend of Britain and a journey through our country's shared history but that made me think about what does it mean to be settled and what what does it mean to be settled in the lives we've constructed as human beings but I also wanted to ask can being more immersed in the wild and wilderness and nature can that paradoxically make us feel more settled so then I kind of explored the history of civilization and how human beings started off as travellers and nomads walking the land and and when I was in settle train station as well I I saw a map on the wall which was dedicated to Wainwright who was a famous traveller and he wrote a book that's when I learned about a book a very quite a slim book of travel writing he wrote called a pen-eye journey and then that gave me further inspiration to make the rest of my journey and think about the shape of the journey I wanted to make because obviously you have the pen-eye way which is Britain's oldest long distance footpath and it starts in the peak district which this this month actually celebrates its 70th anniversary and it was created as I say by the amazing campaigning work of people like the Manchester Ramblers who walked for to open up the countryside then I saw this the pen-eye journey and it made me feel more flexible about the journey the route I wanted to take so that all happened at settle and just thought it was an amazing place to to walk through because of the allegory and then another oh and Wainwright's journey ended at Hadrian's wall and that's why I decided to end my journey at Hadrian's wall. He made his journey in 1938 when Britain was on the cusp of um world war it was a very it was a politically anxious time but we also have been living in such a particularly a politically turbulent time Hadrian's wall became a symbol of empire of immigration of border building and so that was the end of my journey and then other layers of allegory included walking through scars yes so I I mean I just thought it was amazing to learn because it was a learning journey for me as well like the etymology as you know from the book I'm a total word geek I love where where words come from so not only the history of places but of prose and the roots of words so word learn actually means to follow a path and so I was like learning and yearning my way through the pen-eyes literally so the word scar is has multiple meanings it means a limestone cliff an outcrop but well then you have all the other resonant meanings of scar like um so physical and emotional wounds so in the book I make a journey through what I term the Wunderland I mean the north is an incredibly scarred landscape it's a very rich metaphorical place so I was literally walking along a scar I'm walking deeper into the Wunderland so my journey was partly seeking solace in escaping in the beautiful hills but it was also confronting and facing fears and you know looking deeper into the roots of of trauma as well and that was another layer of allegory and and it kind of yeah I just I just loved it and then it was a landscape that gave me that and of course the main the main layer of symbolism is is the backbone at the heart of the book is the back book that will just I mean that and in that spot my imagination from you know the backbone of Britain the fact that the pen-eye range is called the backbone of Britain that you know that gave me the whole idea for the book and it gave me the idea as we spoke about before of structuring the book around the body because I just love the fact that a part of the landscape was named after a part of the body the backbone and that gave me the idea to then build the structure around skin which was obviously at the heart of my experience then to go deeper beneath the skin and show what is deeper than the skin the fact that each and every human being needs oxygen oxygen comes from you know nature so it's from trees and it was really you know it was my bird watching adventure with Margaret Atwood that made me think more deeply about nature as well because she said you know loving your neighbour means loving the air in their lungs and if you love the air in their lungs you have to love what makes the air in their lungs which is nature it's trees which create oxygen it's plants and so I really wanted to get beneath the skin as well so it was the backbone and then life blood after backbone is life blood and the life blood again that's the the metaphor of the rivers that flow through the north my journey was structured around following the course of four rivers so the river air, rebel, tine and tees and I was fascinated by what's known as blue care as well as there's green care which is how being in green spaces is so important to us but also blue care being near water is so good for the mental health and well-being and I really found that on my journey as well so as you say you know I just wanted in the book too I was just really excited by like healing oil those kind of symbolic layers of the landscape but it was the landscape that gave it to me gave me that really because of you know that all the symbolic place names in the north it was the glorious north that gave it gave me the structure of the book and the names of the books yeah and I hope everybody listening to you talking can just hear about how all these intertwining of all these different elements of the book and it's it's really quite magical what what you create out of you know something something terrible you know and your assertion of identity I was just gonna good goes I'm just going on to say you know the the the you talking about the people uh activism of people for example on Kinderstout the mass trespass you write about and uh you you write about your your own your diverse heritage which connects you to Asia and to the Caribbean and to South America and Africa as well as being a proud northern englander um but this this also leads to I think you touched on in the beginning this this lifelong feeling of not quite belonging anywhere so that that you know I have to say this you know it's something that made me think very hard about my own privilege of being deemed to belong wherever I go because of my skin color you know you you really really made me think about that in a way that you know absolutely needed to but um but you you know your your reclamation of identity is all bound up with this closeness to the to the land and your feet the placing of your feet one foot in front of another you write about the power of of walking as well yeah so thank you and I do I think that really ties in with what you picked use the web magical there and I did want to I did want to create something joyful and magical um out of the but I did want the book to be that and I'll tell you why what my inspiration and driving force was that because that summer that I was raised to abuse a friend of mine also died very young she died and very suddenly set the amazing Sophie Christopher she was only 28 years old and she had sent me a card and the card was called it was a thank you card for interviewing an author that she works with and the card was called a little card full of magic and joy so those words drove me on magic and joy as I wanted the book to be filled with magic and joy because it captures that her spirit as well um there's two dedications to the book is in memoriam Sophie Christopher also dedicated to to everyone who's ever felt they don't belong in answers to your question about outside in us and belonging I think that space of being an outsider it can be that liminal space can be you know it can feel like like a negative space that can swallow you up and it can be a lonely space but it can also be a very magical and creative space if you then inhabit it and then you can use that space and reclaim it as your own so I think that that was the for me what became the magic of making the journey was that I used that space not to like be engulfed with loneliness of being an outsider but to reclaim as my own it can be like a kind of alchemy someone said I really mean tweets saying um like I talk about the that you know the when you speak out and you are a woman of color you're subjected to all kinds of like racist trials and someone said the children of immigrants are fated to never belong that's your fate and that's just completely ridiculous because I mean my point in the book is that you know I belong here as much as a white man the man who racially abused me does and you know it's called a journey along the back bone of Britain and I explore Britishness in the book and you know the first thing he said to me is do you have a British passport there's many ironies to my experience warmers that I had my British passport in me in my handbag because I just got back the same week from the former British colony where my mother was born British Guyana so a key point in the book is that brown and black people are no less British than white people and I think that needs to be understood very clearly because that affects how people regard brown and black people as belonging or not belonging to Britain so you know that is a very important for people to understand and I don't think people understand that and the reason that I explore in the book why they don't is because there's you know um British history has been whitewashed from the curriculum so I talk about being you know a brown-skinned child growing up in Manchester and learning more about Henry VIII's wives and colouring in their costumes more than I did about the history of our our country about immigration and colonialism which is just shocking to me that you know we aren't taught more about it and that therefore affect the very toxic idea that brown and black people are somehow not as British as white people then affects how we are regarded as belonging or not belonging in places regarded as quintessentially British and English like the English countryside like green landscapes I mean there's a ridiculous notion that we somehow don't belong walking through the countryside so I wanted to smash those toxic notions and show and say you know we do belong I'm just as British as a white person and I belong here just as much as a white person and I belong in brown and black people belong in green spaces just as much as well yeah and such such an important point from your book and I was going on to mention you know the the pandemic that we've all been living through has you know prompted even more talk and discussion about how essential nature is to all our well-being something that you've clearly lived and breathed and you know there is that in this book and not just over the past two years I know you did an event in in Kendall in the Lake District last year with Lucy Jones who's the author of Losing Eden which is about how our minds need the wild but you know just to pick up on what you were saying there you know you're also arguing passionately that the natural world and national parts access to the countryside again we're talking about you know looping back to the Kinder Scout mass trespass which you mentioned right at the beginning of your book it's most especially needed by those who've suffered deprivation and prejudice and I think we too often think of our world spaces as white spaces and in terms of what we read about them as well I think yeah absolutely this might be a good time to introduce your I belong here foundation work yeah thank you Caroline and I think thank you so much for raising that point because it's an incredibly important aspect of the book I mean it's very much a book about mental health and the importance of you know acknowledging mental health and the fact of how much nature and walking is beneficial for our physical and mental well-being and you know that's you know that's a key message of the book absolutely when I um was suffering from anxiety and depression making this journey through nature was hugely beneficial for my mental health and I think this is a really toxic notion as well and I think it comes from the notion that brown and black people are somehow not as human that our mental health isn't as important there's never a conversation about our mental health in the in the media and I do think it's important for that's why I think it's important you know for someone who isn't white to say you know mental health is also important to me our well-being is important and to lead on to your question about the I belong here foundation yeah I'm thrilled that the news today is announced by the Royal Society of Literature that I've been awarded um of Royal Society of Literature Literature Matters Award to run a series of Northern Nature Writers workshops, nature writing workshops um so and to establish something called the Northern Nature Writers Network and run workshops and create a network and as you say there's a massive inequality and access to nature that's another something as I explore in the book um you know not every and lockdown has shown that inequality really heartbreakingly you know there's people who've been trapped in in tower blocks without access to nature and then there's people have been tweeting their social media pictures about lovely walks in in the local woods so lockdown has shown systemic inequality of all kinds including an access to nature so I want the book um I've taught shared my story in the book but I also want to help other people feel as if they belong and through through the I belong here foundation initiatives such as um the Royal Society of Literatures Award for me to start the Northern Nature Writers Network and run nature writing workshops for those who couldn't otherwise afford to do them I hope to create a sense of belonging and access to nature for everyone and not just for the privileged so that everyone can can say I belong here it's such tremendous news I'm so thrilled with you because um it's your initiative is is really um you know sorely needed and and wonderful to have you at the at the centre of it and I know that you you know you know of what you speak here because um you also write in the book about your childhood uh you grew up right in the heart of Manchester you yourself had very little access to uh there were there are a few parks I think you had very little nature and um there's a wonderful piece and I'm just going to flash this anthology what you've contributed to lots of anthologies but this is Winter um edited by Melissa Harrison and it there's a wonderful piece in there by you which um perhaps you'll tell us about it it's about your your mother planting bulbs in the garden yeah and as I say I do think the issue of um mental health is is stigmatized um I'm too much and it's stigmatized um more for some than others and I did want to smash the stigma around mental health and say you know so many of us have experienced depression and anxiety so I write about how my my uh one of my earliest sometimes I'm asked what's what's your earliest memory of nature one of my earliest memories of nature is understanding what a bulb was so um in this small garden in in the city so my first experience of the wild wasn't the massive you know rain penine range of the countryside it was this it was it was nearby nature which we're all coming to appreciate in lockdown and um it was um noticing a lady bird calling along concrete it was noticing you know a wild flower growing in in the cracks between a pavement but this particular thing was about um um yeah that my childhood garden the garden in my childhood home and so my mum who was suffering depression at the time planted um bulbs in the garden and started cultivating the garden and it's about the therapeutic aspect of having that close connection with the natural world so I remember the first I remember the bulbs being planted and knowing that something magical would happen from them but not really understanding what a bulb was until I saw the first daffodil it's quite words-worthy and but you know in a city children from cities can have words-worthy and experiences of nature as well and you know so it was that first daffodil one once I saw a golden daffodil in Manchester so it was the words it was the golden daffodil that Wordsworth has you know every it's a very very primal thing so what I wanted to show in the book is that the connection with nature and how important it is for our physical and mental well-being is something each and every one of us regardless of our social racial or cultural background experiences it's an incredibly primal part of being human because we are not apart from nature we're all a part of nature as as I say you know nature flows through our lungs it throws through our veins as soon as we breathe in we're breathing oxygen created by trees we're inhaling nature so yeah that was and I do think it's that you know remembering our was we haven't been able to go anywhere in lockdown apart from nearby and local you know local areas so I think remembering memories of nature have been more important than ever as well and drawing on them for for sustenance so yeah I think it's um I think the um link between nature and mental health and how important it is for all our mental health is incredibly important to remember and to understand as well and also the fact that you know the book is also a clarion call it's about my advent you know epic adventure in the Pennine countryside but it's also a clarion call and a cry from the heart to the access to nature for those in cities our city I think I really hope that you know now lockdown's being eased I hope that come 21st of June the summer solstice um when lockdown is supposed to be lifted I hope the world will be recalibrated into a better world and there were all these hopes after the lockdown 1.0 it didn't seem to happen so I hope after you know lockdown 3.0 the world will be recalibrated into a more equal world a cleaner world for those in cities you know we need more trees and green spaces and parks in cities for everyone to access we need more nearby nature and we need to recalibrate the world so it's a more equal world and a world in which every single human being and every single creature great and small feels as if they belong in because they do belong in it and you know I start from the premise that the world is our shared home you know home is a big theme in the book it starts from the from the idea that you know this world is all of our homes and we all belong here oh amen to that I mean we can only hope that that's where we'll be going um from here um I it I would like to move to some audience questions in just a minute so I'm just going to ask you one more thing just to give everybody a chance to to post if they haven't already done so so um you can do that in the question box below the video feed if you haven't already done so and I think I've got some coming through here so excuse me if I'm just looking down Anita um but I just wanted to I think talk to a teeny bit more about the walking aspect because we've talked a lot about them that the landscape and being in nature and you know the mental health aspects of your book but there's something there's something powerful about you a woman on your own walking a woman of colour walking but also I think I said earlier they're putting one foot in front of another and you say something very interesting about embodiment oh yeah could you just just talk to us for a minute about that because I that was very struck by that thank you that's such a good question and it's so important to the book so anxiety emotions such as anxiety fear or depression they can make you what's called be derealised or have a sense of disembodiment and I do think you know experiences like racism lead people to not fully inhabit their own bodies because we've been culturally conditioned to think that like our skin colour somehow isn't as good you know as white skin we don't I don't I think I don't think a lot of us fully inhabit ourselves and certainly experiences like anxiety leads to derealisation and a sense of disembodiment which is why walking is physiologically good for the well-being I have interviewed experts for the book including Alan Keller of the Royal Society of Psychiatrists and you know they they you know shared their insight into what walking does to us physiologically and why it is actually good for us and it does create a sense of embodiment it makes you it makes you be there it makes you you know the books I belong here and to be able to say I belong here was a process of embodiment and also I think society has there's too much separation of body and mind in the way we think of ourselves and actually the way we use our bodies is going to affect our emotional well-being because it's connected so if you're walking it improves your mood it triggers orphaned orphans the mind and body profoundly connected and that's another reason why I structured the book around the body to show how the body and mind are connected so walking was yeah it was a profoundly embodying and inhabiting experience like I came to inhabit myself again and so you know all of us our home is also ourselves so we I belong here is saying that I belong in my own body in my own self in the world so it was like an embodying experience I had to learn to inhabit myself again when experiences like racism and especially when you've had you I was born into a world which is systemically equal right I grew up you know I was born into a world which was magazines I read into the child as a teenager growing up they were not like there are many brown models that we were like in all the teenage fashion magazines that we saw we were made to think that you know it was bad to like have this skin color it wasn't something to you know be proud of and that's only really changed fairly recently in the scale of things and all of those that context leads to a sense of not fully inhabiting yourself so I do think context is important and you know that's why I wanted to show as you picked up on so and well in your write-up of the book you know you use a term current affair I wanted to show how individuals are connected to societies and the cultural context that we grow up in shapes who we are how we think and people say is it a political book and I'm like well there's the personalist political you can't really separate them so by making the journey I was walking through all all those toxic notions that I have been I and so many others have made to feel through societal conditioning and just smashing or like walking walking them away really and learning to inhabit myself and you. So interesting I have a question here from Jane Carruthers she would like to know what's the most surprising thing you learned about yourself or more widely as a result of the journey you went on she says she's really looking forward to reading the book it sounds like it touches on so many important and timely topics which it absolutely does so yes the most the most surprising thing you learned about yourself or more widely. Well I think that you can't walk you can't make a journey along the Penn Highway Britain's oldest long-distance footpath without improving stamina so I mean put it this way I was terrible at PE at school as any school friends out there watching this will know they will know that my school my P teachers will actually be in shock to know that I did this because I was not like the sporty kid so you know I wasn't winning all the awards for physical activity at school but that because I had inertia I was the teachers would write that I had inertia and that's because I had childhood anxiety that's the reason why and so it was my own stamina and that you know I will say that it was like I was surprised by my own strength and you know a key thing in the book is about notions of strength and when you look at the natural world one thing that I found empowering about it was how tenacious nature is so there's a phrase be more like like in and then it's looking at notions like strength like spider silk is the strongest substance you know spider silk is and that's another allegorical symbolic thing I drew on from nature you think the strongest substance is diamonds actually spider silk is incredibly strong so it was kind of finding the strength in my own self and knowing that I could rely on myself and that you know the resources that I needed were within myself and to trust myself more trust in my own strength as it were. I have a question from Tallulah Ellender and she would like to know is there one place from your journey that feels like a particularly special happy place for you? Absolutely so it was when I reached the top of a mountain called Pennegan and the journey was upwards I was literally walking upwards through the hills and that was near Maya Angelou has the poem which was inspirational to me you may kill me with your hatefulness but still like air I'll rise my journey was literally geographically upwards but then emotionally upwards as well and so it was it was reaching the summit of Pennegan and it was incredibly disappointing at first because I was stuck inside a cloud and it was a massive disappointment I couldn't not see a thing I could not see beyond my own hand and everyone would say everyone said you can you'll be able to get an amazing view and so it was disappointing but then I just waited for a while other walkers you know went just didn't have the pay they walked on and they missed it and then gradually the cloud began to clear and the world was like reborn again into color and then the greens and the blues and the gold all appeared and so for me it was as you you know that phrase was a happy place because it was again another symbol symbolic place saying that if you feel lost and stuck inside a cloud and you can't see anything beyond you you know just to the clouds were clear and the world will be reborn into lucid it's possible to reach a place of lucidity and clarity after a time of being lost I love that I love the the bit about Panigant it's a it's a it's really interesting the place you I'm not going to reveal it now but the place you stay is really interesting unique spectacular thing I think and I don't have a name for this question but there's a question here which is what is your notion of home we talked about settle didn't we well I would prefer that there's a million dollar question what is your what is my notion of incredibly interesting question and I would point people towards my I belong here playlist oh yes I'll mention that very extensive list of songs about home I mean this question is a question that writers musicians and artists have been grappling with since the dawn of time what is home where is home so on the playlist I have songs ranging from wherever I lay my hat that's my home and at the moment I would say pretty much that's my answer because I'm a bit you know unsettled so wherever I lay my hat that's my home and also the fact that you know I do think it's home is we do need to feel a sense of home in places where we're perceived as not belonging so one of the epigraphs that closes the book is you don't belong no place you belong every place and that's another Maya Angelou quote you belong every place so I kind of my notions of I used to like search for a fixed sense of home and feel extremely anxious if I didn't have you know very the kind of home that we are again it's about societal cultural conditioning people have a very traditional notion of home and what family is and family structures and we're conditioned to feel like that and feel that oh we don't quite belong we don't have a home if our home doesn't conform to a traditional stereotype but I just think those notions are so toxic for example you know if like I grew up in a home which was you know I have divorced parents and that was very stigmatized in the 80s it was somehow seen as what was called people will use the phrase broken home which is such a negative thing to say broken home you come from a broken home so I kind of smash all those ideas of home and say well home is quite an organic concept and home is I just think home can be much more fluid concepts and you can make your own home for yourself and fundamentally when you start from the idea that the world is your home it's all of our shared home I think all of the kind of toxic political barriers between us racial and societal barriers between us just naturally dissolve when you realize that you know the world is our home it's a very simple thing to say but you know the world is my the world is our home it's all of our homes but I do also say that you know I find a home in words as well so for me writing the book was making a home for myself and I do think a lot of writers and artists musicians feel that if when you grow up when if you grow up with a more complex sense of home as I did I always did for me you know writing is making a home for myself out of words so I always found that I found that when I've written since childhood and I'd write stories reading is very much giving a home for yourself as well it's a home for your mind so I'd say in terms of notions of home writing this book was making a home for my story of belonging so this is my story's home and books are books can provide a sense of home in that way it might not be homes for a body you know we can't literally but they're definitely homes for our mind and for our spirit yes I know when we when we talk before you said something very powerful about you know walking and writing writing and walking and you know the healing after writing and you know that that came out for me very powerfully because I'm glad you've touched on that it's such an interesting question I feel like it could have a whole hour on it's absolutely fascinating I mean it's something that I will continue exploring so for as long as I I will be writing because you know it's something that I'm continually questioning and asking because this is the first book in a trilogy isn't it absolutely the book answers you know raises more questions and which I'll continue to explore and absolutely this theme of where is home how can we feel at home in ourselves where do we all belong it's something it's the age old primal question that I will continue to explore in the rest of the trilogy and probably anything else I write is something that you know every every human being asks themselves and it's something and I would also say you know of of course the answer to that question is that you know I gained a deeper sense of home through gaining that connection with nature and that's how I gained a sense of home in this book because walking and connecting with nature and realizing my profound connection with the wild and wilderness and with the natural landscape gave me a sense of home because it made me feel at home and myself and in the world more than I have done before because also people say you know is it scary for you walking through the countryside as a woman of color is it why ethnic minorities not go to the countryside because it's scary for them I was like this is just absolutely ridiculous obviously I stick out like a sore brown thumb in the countryside however I would encourage everyone to go and to the you know the natural landscapes in the countryside because I say you know a bird or a butterfly is not going to ask you where you're from they don't care so the nature is incredibly unjudgmental in that way but it's still a living thing they're still you can walk by a river and it's a very alive they're living entities but you know a bird or a butterfly these kind of living creatures they could not care less where you're from and that's an incredibly liberating thing and so for me you know the books are very much about friendship as well because as I said it you know has the death of a friend in the book and it was a it was about me finding companionship and solace in nature and I do think you can find companionship with the birds and the natural world and wildlife because you know they're living they're living entities and they can bring a great deal of solace and people have sought solace in nature since since the dawn of time it's an incredibly primal thing and so in answer to the question of home you know I found a greater sense of home and belonging in my connection with nature which is important to spell out because I know our event is part of the celebrating the natural world which as you say all of us could have come to appreciate more in lockdown yeah um yeah that's such an interesting question now we've only got about five minutes left and I'm going to ask you one more question which which again probably we could talk about for a long time but Sarah Jane Roberts is asking which writers and poets have inspired you the most and which landscapes would you love to wander and visit the most post-pandemic thank you if that's Sarah Jane Roberts from Manchester Lit Festival yes it is indeed hello Manchester show out to the Manchester massive out there it's nice to have you out there Manchester's at the heart of this book and it's great that the British Library is like going northern in the zoom sessions as well and reaching in all so so many different inspirations I was inspired by in this the writing of this book I was inspired by female natural right female writers and adventurers who've made epic journeys so there's a book called tracks by robin davidson there's wild by Cheryl straig in terms of in terms of a quote an inspirational quote that's always inspired me it's Tony Morrison if there's a book you want to read and it hasn't been written yet then you must write it and for me you know I have a lot of inspirations like the writers I've just mentioned Margaret out was very inspirational to me to in our bird watching adventure and but ultimately I don't feel that you know I don't feel that I seen myself or my story reflected in a book for and the why does anyone become a writer if not to make a home for their own story so I feel to use that journey and path metaphor I feel that I'm following in the footsteps of all these writers that have come before me they've powered me on and inspired me like I talk about a pen on journey that book is you know influential to my book Wainwright's pen on journey but you know he was making his adventure as a white man and to be honest the book's incredibly misogynistic it's quite shockingly so I am like I have these inspirations but I am also forging a path of my own and that's why I think anyone becomes a writer you have these influences and inspirations but then you you make your own path as well another inspiration if I can just very very quickly read it is the fantastic Antonio Machado and there's a path because the book's about following preset footpaths but it's also about forging your own path as you go as well and this is a very very very short but this has been incredibly inspirational to me it's Antonio Machado Spanish traveler your footprints are the only road nothing else traveler there is no road you make your own path as you walk as you walk you make your own road and when you look back you see the path you will never travel again traveler there is no road and your ships wake on the sea and that to me I was just found out so haunting because it's saying you know we all follow the the footpath that have been made but each and every one of us is unique like we have a unique thumbprint each of our paths through life is uniquely all make our unique path through life and that's the kind of the paradox of being human because we're all fundamentally the same connected and we all need oxygen to live but at the same time we're all unique as well so it was that kind of paradox I wanted to convey in the book as well. What an absolutely glorious perfect note to finish on it's been it's been so inspiring listening to you Anita and that hour's gone so quickly there's so much more I could have asked you now you can buy a copy of I belong here this I think magnificent book via the bookshop tab on your screen I think it's in the menu above I can't I can't see it but I hope you can find it because I hope very much that you will want to buy it thank you so much for joining us and for watching and for your thoughtful questions and of course thank you so so much to Anita for being such a wonderful interviewee and writing such an extraordinary book and a redemptive book and in so many ways a book that we need to read right now you know coming out of something so very terrible I think you've heard what magic Anita has weaved from that experience so thank you Caroline thank you for being such a wonderful interviewer and such a perceptive and insightful reader it's just an absolute privilege to be interviewed by you thank you to the British Library for hosting us we're thrilled to have been hosted by a forum that's also hosted Dolly Parton as Caroline and I are both Dolly Parton big fans yes we'll get her next we'll get her along next time yeah and thanks to everyone watching at home and thank you to each and every reader who ends up buying the book and reading it a huge thank you to Anita and Caroline for that fantastic discussion and just a reminder that if you want to buy the book you can do so using the link just above the video you can also give us your feedback it's really important to us so please do take the time and if you're able you can donate to the British Library if you've enjoyed this event do check out our season on nature and environment and that's called the natural word thank you and good night from the British Library